Did you know you can withdraw Foreign Currencies from your Local ATM in Hong Kong? That's right, you don't have to wait until you travel overseas to withdraw foreign currencies and potentially incur Overseas ATM withdrawal fees.

This post is intentionally split from my post on the Best Multi-Currency Debit Card in Hong Kong and Best Multi-Currency Debit Card in Hong Kong for Overseas ATM Withdrawal because not everyone needs to or wants to withdraw cash when the world is increasingly cashless.

Quick Recap and Summary

Multi-currency debit cards are about minimizing the number of times (and cost) when exchange currency overseas, and avoiding the 1.95% foreign transaction fee typically associated with credit cards in Hong Kong. In my opinion:

HSBC offer the best multi-currency debit card in Hong Kong

Should you need cash overseas, HSBC also has the best Multi-Currency Debit Mastercard for Overseas ATM Withdrawal.

While you can always make Overseas ATM withdrawals, it may be less convenient and more costly. What if you could make local ATM withdrawals in a foreign currency instead?

Local ATM Withdrawals are cheaper than Overseas ATM withdrawals

When you can withdraw cash from an ATM owned by your local bank, you can avoid the surcharges imposed by banks owning the ATM overseas.

Foreign Currency ATMs in Hong Kong

There are currently 4 banks I know of that allow you to use your bank's Multi-Currency Debit Mastercard to withdraw multiple foreign currencies - other than RMB - in Hong Kong. For simplicity, as most banks in Hong Kong now offer RMB withdrawal, I will exclude those banks that do not offer withdrawals beyond HKD and RMB from the table below.

In the table below, the columns containing the bank name lists that currencies the banks' multi-currency account supports. The column to the right of the column with the banks' name lists the currencies you can withdraw from the Foreign Currency ATM in Hong Kong.

Banks Standard Chartered Citibank Hang Seng HSBC
Supported Currencies 11 6 12 4 12 4 to 12 12 4
  HKD ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  USD ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  GBP ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  JPY ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  EUR ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  RMB ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  AUD ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  NZD ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  SGD ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  CAD ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  CHF ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  THB ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  ZAR ✔
  KRW ✔
  TWD ✔

Fees for Local Foreign Currency ATMs

As far as I can tell, as these Foreign Currency ATMs are owned by the bank that issued you your Multi-Currency debit Mastercard, there is no withdrawal fee when the debit card is from the same bank that owns the ATM, provided you have sufficient balance.

When the multi-currency debit card used is different from the bank owning the foreign currency ATM, then local ATM withdrawal fees may apply as this is an interbank transaction.

Additional fees may also apply depending on whether your foreign currency balance is sufficient or not, and which currency you are withdrawing.

Standard Chartered

6 out of 11 currencies are supported for withdrawal, but the catch here is Standard Chartered only has one Digital Teller location in Hong Kong where you can withdraw, so this is the least convenient solution. The location is the Central, Exchange Square branch.

Citibank

4 out of 12 currencies are supported for foreign currency withdrawal, but not all foreign currency ATMs support 4. Many only support 2 currencies out of the 4. There is no search option or single viewable map on the Citibank ATM locations page, so you just have to scroll and look yourself.

Hang Seng

Hang Seng may be the winner here because their Foreign Currency ATMs support 4, 8 or 12 foreign currencies, including 2 additional unsupported currencies; Korean Won and Taiwanese Dollars.

You can also withdraw KRW and TWD

The exchange rate for these 2 unsupported currencies is based on the Mastercard rate. Hang Seng customers are getting convenience and bypassing overseas ATM fees/surcharges that customers of other banks would have to deal with!

Hang Seng's Foreign Currency ATM page presents the location information in a more readable form despite the absence of a map view. Even without search functionality it is easy to tell which ATMs are open 24 hours and how many currencies they support.

Available types of foreign currency

Currencies Multi-Currency Account ATM with 4 ATM with 8 ATM with 12
  HKD ✔
  USD ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  GBP ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  JPY ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  EUR ✔ ✔ ✔
  RMB ✔
  AUD ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
  NZD ✔ ✔
  SGD ✔
  CAD ✔ ✔ ✔
  CHF ✔ ✔
  THB ✔ ✔ ✔
  ZAR ✔
  KRW ✔
  TWD ✔ ✔

HSBC

HSBC supports withdrawing 4 out of 12 popular currencies for those of us residing in Hong Kong: RMB, JPY, USD and EUR.

HSBC Foreign Currency ATMs locations outnumber the other local banks with Foreign Currency ATMs, and all of them offer the same 4 currencies.

HSBC is the only bank out of the 4 identified with a searchable map view of Foreign Currency ATMs.

The Best Foreign Currency ATM is ....

Hang Seng for most foreign currencies supported. Qualify for Hang Seng Prestige (or higher tiers) to get the best exchange rates.

HSBC for convenience; the largest numbers of Foreign Currency ATMs. If you have HSBC Premier Elite status, then you will only pay ATM surcharges (usually USD 5) if you withdraw from an ATM that is not owned by HSBC Group.